Frayed Knot

YAY Us!!

]Current State of the Mets Georgia

Line-Up Shake-Up time: Reyes Green Beltran Wright LoDuca Delgado Easley Gomez Perez

Willets Point wrote: Isn't the theory behind the draft that it prevents rich teams from stockpiling lots of talent in the minors when those players may be good enough to actually be starting players on other teams? That is the kids' careers are hurt toiling in Dubuque waiting for Wally Slugger to twist his ankle in New York when they could be starting everyday for the Royals. That's more like why things like 6-year minor legue FA-gency and the Rule 5 draft were put in; to prevent teams from holding onto players forever and rotting their careers away in the bushes if their chance never came. The draft was put in to keep the rich teams from getting a hold of most of the best players in the first place (and to hold down signing bonuses). Seeing as how the NFL & NBA draft have survived challenges to their much more restrictive drafts recently, I don't see the MLB draft going away anytime soon.

Most of the noise being made in favor of an international draft is done in the name of the weaker/poorer clubs. But the kicker is that those clubs don't neccesarily want the "help" and are often the ones against such a draft. What those teams see in outposts like the DR & Venezuela is the ability to be entrepenurial and proactive by beating the bushes in order to give themselves a shot at the next unknown gem, or at least a handful of good players with a chance to develop. Houston was big on this by being one of the first into Venezuela and mined a bunch of ballplayers no one else had seen like Bobby Abreu, Johan Santana, Richard Hidalgo and others -- (they just needed help knowing which ones to hold onto). Those teams know that they're at a disadvantage for the few big-ticket guys from the Carribean or Asia, but they're more or less OK with that in exchange for the freedom to scout the bushes for the rest of the talent. Look at it this way; No one would go turning over every rock for raw talent if they knew there was only a 1-in-30 shot at signing him, and there are those who think that including Puerto Rico in the draft (late '80s sometime) helped dry up the talent coming off that island for that very reason.

Gary little speech Tuesday night wasn't anti-Met, he just couldn't understand why MLB hadn't got around to instituting an international draft a la NBA & NHL.

Good piece by Joe Sheehan in today's Baseball Prospectus

I smell another non-apology coming. * Hey, my posts got the "Wright" stuff

Loduca - 2.0 Beltran - 1.0 Burgos - 1.0

Okajima (the other Japanese pitcher) gives up his first run since opening day but it's 7-3 Sox after 8. Now Papelbon, in for the 9th ining, puts the first 2 runners on base. - Melky (PH-ing) Strikes Out ... that's the 3rd hitter Torre's used in the 9-hole this game: Mnkwicz to Phelps to Melky - Damon grounds to 2nd ... runners move up to 2nd & 3rd - Jeter Strikes Out Looking ... and gee, he doesn't agree with the call !?! Back to 10.5 games

Yanx drew 1st blood Monday night in their hoped-for rehabilitation tour. Both Wang and Wakefield put a million guys on base in a typical 3-1/2 hour game, but the Sox left most of their runners stranded and ARod HR'd in his 3rd straight game. The Game 2 matchup seems to favor the Yanx as Julian Tavarez faces Mussina ... except that Manny's monster 3R HR in the 1st says otherwise so far.

Not quite, that's BA / [u:bf575e130a]SLG[/u:bf575e130a] / OPS ... although that 2 HR / 3 IW day probably didn't hurt his OBA either

Andruw plummeting down the lineup following his 5 - count 'em, [u:3e6ef40aec]FIVE[/u:3e6ef40aec] - strikeout day the other day.

Late news from just this afternoon: The Braves have released pitcher Mark Redman (something about his 11.63 ERA I guess). Their main problem this year has been their starters once past Hudson (who we'll miss) and Smoltz. In his place they're bringing up pitcher Joey Devine - a college reliever (a rare choice for an Atlanta 1st round draft pick in 2005) who stuck briefly with the big club in both '05 & '06. Also new since the last time we saw Los Bravos is sweet-swinging Jarrod Saltalamacchia (MLB record holder for longest last name ever). A catcher in the minors, they might be using him at 1st base so as to get both his bat and McCann's in the lineup.

Pssst Suzyn, it's not just MadDog ... EVERYONE is making fun of your Clemens rant!

DIVTEAMRECORDOPS RANKERA RANKAL-ERED SOX28 - 1211AL-CINDIANS25 - 1527AL-CTIGERS24 - 1636AL-WANGELS22 - 18123AL-WA's20 - 20112AL-CWHITE SOX19 - 21145AL-WMARINERS19 - 21T-812AL-CTWINS18 - 2284AL-EBLUE JAYS18 - 2258AL-EYANKS18 - 22411AL-EORIOLES18 - 221010AL-ED'RAYS18 - 22614AL-WRANGERS15 - 25T-813AL-CROYALS13 - 27139

That's why part of my fantasy (at least my baseball fantasy) involves the Yanx not only finishing out of the money but also well behind both the Sawx and the Astros.

Wright - 1.3 Easley - 1.0 Schoeneweis - 0.3 Heilman - 1.0 Feliciano - 0.3 LoDuca - 0.8 Gotay - 0.5

And, in case you think comebacks of this magnitude are one in a million shots, or that they only happen to Yanx/BoSox, we've got examples from other teams in very recent history who were right about where the Yanx are now and at a similar point in the season: - 2006 Twins: 17 - 24 ---->>> finished 96 - 66 that's 79 - 42 after that point - 2005 Astros: 15 - 30 ---->>> finished 89 - 73 (74 - 43) - 2002 A's: 19 - 25 ---->>> finished 103 - 59 (84 - 34) ... and that was with Art Howe as the skipper

Jinxes ain't got nuthin' to do with it. They gained 10 games on the BoSox in just one month last year: July 21 = 3.5 back ----->>>>> Aug 21 = 6.5 ahead Between their high-scoring lineup and a (possible) rotation in a month or so of Mussina, Pettitte, Wang, Clemens & Hughes they certainly have the ability to make up a similar 10 games over the next 4 months.

It's [u:6a0fd511b1]MAY[/u:6a0fd511b1] This race is far from over.

"David Wright may have just hit the first home-run in Citi-Field history" -- Howie Rose following Wright's first HR on Saturday which landed near the construction.

Willets Point wrote: Should we put Easley on notice for swinging for the fences when the teams five runs down? I don't think he was. Just a nice swing dat's all.

Not going down so Easley

Let's make Rivera throw about a million-teen pitches this inning and fuck him up for the Boston series.